


To meet is the beginning of parting

by uchihas1000



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: After story taking place post 179, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Original Character(s), Rule no.1 on mutsuki's houehold dont fkIn TOUCH THE KITCHEN, Skinny love at some point bc im a sucker for it, Urie keeping his promises bc he aint a coward in this household, i was never good with tags but basically you'll get sad occasionally
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-05
Updated: 2018-08-27
Packaged: 2019-06-05 17:26:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 21,669
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15175700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uchihas1000/pseuds/uchihas1000
Summary: “ I guess, I’ll take silence as a permission to leave then.” He let out another soft sigh, but this time it was dejected, and tired.





	1. Chapter 1

“I guess, I’ll see you around.”

Where is around? What is around? When will that be? He shifted to the other side of the bed facing the wall. His breaths were far from serene; nails digging the flesh of his palms brutally; eyes rapidly moving around under the lids. Although his feet were paralyzed by a heavy sleep, he had been sprinting for a while now, desperately trying to catch up with the someone who guessed he’d see him around.  Except he was nowhere to be found, his figure was hazy, the traces behind though, vivid and hopefully not misleading. Teeth clenched, he ran like a wild horse removed out of its leash after that trace, that smell. It was so familiar and comforting, yet distant and hard to approach. He wasn’t to the slightest aware he took a physical body with him when he ran, until he felt the ground crush up his body, becoming one. Looking up, he might have noticed just a strand of green hair flung around, and a side eyes looking down on him.

_“I guess, I’ll see you around.”_

And then they were…home. Saiko was being loud because Haise hadn’t put enough syrup in her pancake. And he was silently drinking his coffee. Everything was too unreal, from his presence, to Shirazu’s, to Haise allowing Saiko even have syrup on her pancakes, to a burnt smell from the kitchen where Haise was a master on. After he studied the steam dancing away from his coffee mug¾ hands wrapped around its warmth¾ he raised his gaze up at him, curious, jittery with coffee and raw from sleeplessness. The aura around his felt nostalgic; from his sensitive dark eyes to his usual morning turtleneck sweater where he used to warm his breath under. It was a rare part of the day where he didn’t have his eye patch on, so both his eyes were judging him playfully.

“Good morning, Urie-kun. You’ve been staring at me for 2 minutes and,” he pauses to look back at his imaginary clock. “35 seconds. What’s up?”

He didn’t grasp any strand of discomfort from his posture. He was merely trying to bring his sleepy head back to his breakfast which had been resting for quite some time, and expose his obvious habits on the way. It was a habit, yes. He didn’t like to admit it, but he followed the movement of the fingers over each page when he flipped to the next chapter; he liked to see him struggle to put his hair on a small pony tail before training, leaving some bangs cover his forehead; he hesitated to deny polite offers to do the dishes even though he hates touching wet food and generally touching anything with his bare hands; he never minded when their legs brushed accidentally during a meeting and he might have reserved a sketch book just for him. Annoyance crept at him when he exposed his embarrassing habits like this.  He used to feel annoyance, now he just felt an old tenderness slowly wrap around his chest, a fondness he had forgot the intensity of, until this…

He didn’t answer; he just looked back at him, trying to bring back to his memory everything his attention had missed long time ago.

His breaths seemed to have slowed their pace down, his jaw relaxed, his heartbeat steady, cheeks damp, no reason to wake up. Everything was fine; everything is going to be fine.

 

“I can’t continue to deceive myself anymore. I’m so sorry.”

The shine of his knife pierced his eyes and he felt distant again. He was paralyzed on the ground; he saw the knife pressing down his pulse; he saw his hand shake while he forced a sob down his throat. He should have kicked it out of his hands; he should have asked back then when he felt things were going south; he should ha-

 

“It’s painful being alone. It’s agonizing. You’re okay, and we’re going to be alright.”

 

We’re going to be alright. We’re going to be alright. Not that he knew what he was feeling; he just pressed his head on his shoulder, numbed by repressed sadness and tired from accumulated anger. He trusted him, they might as well be…

 

“I forgot to tell you, I was offered a position at a remote branch. Maybe the fresh air will ease me some way. It won’t be for another two weeks until I move out, however. I will try to visit as many times as I can, hopefully…aand, the classical gaze has surface again. Welcome back, lost Uri.” His facial features, although lacking nuance most of the time, could afford to let out a soft sight before he pulled back to his usual demeanor. His throat tied itself up and wasn’t expecting any words to come out anytime soon.  What a damn surprise. Welcome back, lost Uri.

“ I guess, I’ll take silence as a permission to leave then.” He let out another soft sigh, but this time it was dejected, and tired.

“Do tell everyone for me please. I don’t want Saiko to kick my ass for disappearing again without telling anyone.” More silence.

“Well, I guess I’ll see you around then.” He knew what he left behind before he got up; he was well aware of the anxiety that was hanging around Urie’s features, how his hand was gripping the mug firmly enough to snap it to pieces; he knew an anxiety-ridden Urie when he saw one. He only swallowed one last time, gave a hurried grin, before he averted his eyes back to where he was heading.

 

His breathing was now rapid and choppy and there was an unhealthy amount of pressure building on his jaw. He clutched on his shirt, as if it were the cause of his disturbed breathing. He snapped his eyes open, already broken into a cold sweat that forced his wobbly body soon to take a shower. It was four o’clock in the morning, but he already had taken his pills of guilt for that day. He might come back for the regular dosage in about 24 hours. Until then he’ll manage to survive.

 

 

 

 


	2. Hiraeth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “How have you been, how’s everyone doing? Does Saiko still eat the entire jar of marshmallows in one go because ‘it contributes to her overall softness’ ?”   
> “Hsiao had to talk her out of it through the phone, but she’s a tough one. Nothing out of the ordinary.”  
>  Pause.   
> “And you?”   
> Another pause.

4:30. It’s not that sleep would pay a visit any time soon, or would invite any special guest like his mental tranquility on the way. They had turned on his heel, no sign of coming back for now. He threw the phone on his side, rubbing some tension away from his temples. Bit the inside of his cheek; closed the window blowing too much on him; sat on his bed. His stomach shifted uneasily, while he unconsciously felt his legs get fidgety _._

 _I guess, I’ll take silence as a permission to leave then._ He felt a vicious hand penetrate his stomach and pull it in a knot. He was finding it unbearable to let his hands unoccupied. The sketchbook on the side of the worktable had been left opened; maybe he could try to doodle something until the sun came up. Commanding fingers to grip the texture of the paper, they obeyed. They managed to hold a pencil in a position ready to make contact with the paper, but something similar to a disturbed figure came to life, and it built up more tension on his joint, securing the knot on his stomach viciously, his lungs deprived of oxygen.

_(just sit in silence again, won’t you)_

Maybe he could visit since he had some days off. The last time he saw him was probably six months ago, hell, probably more. Saiko always video calls, but that’s just a screen he had to believe reflected him. Physical meetings were too awkward and short.  It agitated him how he was unable to recall certain facial expressions of his while sketching, as if certain pieces of the mosaic that made his face had been pulled away in a manner that never indicated any previous sign of existence in the first place. He felt defeated and beaten down.

 

Walking down the stairs slowly, he already felt the busy wave of morning-stricken voices trying to not be late for work. Yusa was at the kitchen saving everyone from starvation, Saiko was too busy trying to keep herself up and Hige… was being Hige.  He did have a noticeable backpack on his shoulders, so he couldn’t expect the ideal scenario of walking out the door like a phantom. But he could bear just with a brief interrogation.

“Behold, Urie hasn’t risen with the sun today.” Saiko sure was completely drained off of energy in the morning, but not to tease Urie for literally breathing. It was part of her morning routine. Couldn’t blame her.

“ (Yeah, I watched it come up.) How observant.” His tone has some bitterness leak here and there, he knew what was coming next.

“Here, by the way,” she manages to drag her feet near the counter and grab a couple of snacks that weren’t particularly her taste. “tell him I didn’t forget.” She gave him a cunning smile before sliding back to the kitchen table. He grabbed the bag in a confused manner before looking back at her as she threw a wink at him.

“(Damn observant, indeed.) I’m heading out now.” As the door shut down behind him, he managed to faintly hear Higemaru grasp of realization as he put together everything a couple of days late. Good thing he passed smoothly out of that door.

 

They had visited only once with Saiko when he needed some help to move out, but that was a couple of years back, and his memory might just die on him on the way. He’ll try to survive. It was only a two hour long train ride of sitting and killing time. Chugging down what was left in the water bottle, he grabbed his sketchbook from an easy reach and tried to brush some dust off of his memory.

Two hours were surprisingly easy to kill, as he finally detrained and landed himself on something close to the land of nowhere, somewhere only streetlights’ reflection could be made out the surface of the flooded rice fields. After asking around for some directions, he finally arrived at the countryside, whose mid-may mood was really bringing the best out of the asphalted but still phased by the hands of corrosion and time roads. Cherry blossoms never looked this vibrant in the city, thriving with health, beauty, characterized by the petite aura that smoothed the edges of the stoic minka roofs. A couple of turns on the way led him to a house pretty standard looking if you didn’t throw a second glance to notice the freshness of a newly reconstructed house. The surrounding houses probably belonged to elderly and he was starting to question just how did he keep his sanity on check being this far from the city. City boys.

 

He wouldn’t have known that house belonged to him if he hadn’t picked the sight of a green haired boy sitting at the veranda wooden floor absentmindedly munching on some sandwich with seemingly nothing on ,but a loose t-shirt that could pretty curiously fit his legs tugged in. The peculiarity of the sight brought back memories and a nostalgic tenderness that he had buried somewhere far from reach. He couldn’t hold back a soft smile before he walked neared¾light headed from the sun and faintly blushed cheeks with a pink hue over his milky skin.

 

Just as Mutsuki randomly averted his eyes up, he caught the sight of the tall man who was really close to fainting but trying to “keep it together”. And his haircut, or rather his uncut hair, was the most questionable thing that stood out. Undoubtedly Urie. Just as they locked eyes, his face was occupied by an amused doubt as his eyebrows narrowed but couldn’t hold a smile back. Tiling head on one side, he got up, brush his back and signaled him eagerly to come inside. After leaving back a really picturesque view for later, he enters a rather big house for a single person to live in. Although one could pick up pieces of modern motifs here and there, it followed the traditional track religiously¾sliding doors, use of wood, tatami floor, and a kotatsu where Saiko would probably spend her remaining life on. It smelled of lavender and rice straw, but mostly loneliness.

He laid his backpack slowly on the floor while allowing himself to nearly collapse in exhaustion. Mutsuki fetched some water for both and sat opposite him in anticipation. After drinking his glass almost breathlessly, he gave one last sigh before he locked eyes again with him.

“Oh, by the way, Saiko wanted me to give you these. “Says Urie in a hesitant tone while fetching the bag of snacks. His face lit up to the sight of trash food in the midst of so much healthy food he at times needed to force down because “good shape” and living in the midst of almost nowhere.

“I genuinely love her so much; I have been saved. But I’m still not convinced that you travelled with that thing on your back for almost three hours just to run errands for Saiko. “ He’s been sitting for only five minutes and he’s already being teased. His life revolved nowhere near taking a break from any of that.

“That’s because I didn’t.”

“Well, that’s good to know.” He lets out a shy smile that was brushed off by a really eager expression to know more, as he rested his chin on both his hands.

“How have you been, how’s everyone doing? Does Saiko still eat the entire jar of marshmallows in one go because ‘it contributes to her overall softness’ ?”

“Hsiao had to talk her out of it through the phone, but she’s a tough one. Nothing out of the ordinary.” 

Pause.

“And you?”

Pause.

“ (Me? Oh, just taking the usual daily dosage of guilt because I couldn’t even say goodbye when you left.) Being chewed on by work on a daily basis.” He sighed.

“No I mean, how are you feeling? Is everything… alright?”

“(Not to the fucking slightest.) I’m hanging in there, I think.” His eyes are now following the bids of water sliding down the glass, as the ice shifted position, and clinks, cracking the silence for just a little.

“You don’t really seem in shape to me; you seem to have lost weight and… what happened to your hair? To me, that’s far from hanging in there. Are you sure Yusa knows how to cook? “

“I dropped the huge weights, couldn’t see the appeal of it anymore. (Why are you bullying my hair all of a sudden?!) Work doesn’t leave much space for any kind of personal treatment, does it?” He really went where Urie prayed he wouldn’t. He forced a grin that showed defeat and embarrassment.

“Do you , um, haha, maybe want me to give you a haircut? I’ no pro, but it will look better than… that, that’s for sure.” He released his chin from the grip of his hands and locked his fingers together in a really formal position that indicated they were ready to work.

“If you insist.” I might have subtly wanted this to happen, but would rather suffocate in hair than ask for it.

“ Ookay then. The bathroom is right down the corner. I’ll be back right away.” He got up rather eagerly to grab his tools and meet Urie there.

It was a well lit bathroom, with a wooden bathtub elevated just a stair up, a couple of small wooden buckets on the side and a tabouret just in front of the sink, and the mirror that covered most of the wall. He laid a razor and a pair of scissors at the side of the sink and allowed Urie to sit down. He placed him hands on his shoulders and examined his face for a while.

It was interesting how, although on his late twenties, he looked like he hadn’t aged a day since he remembered watching his face every day. There were two faint lines near the edge of his lips, which indicated he had allowed himself to enjoy some time out of the usual resting ,stern but unintentionally so expression. He was glad. His cheeks were slightly pink in contrast with the usual unhealthy white skin of his from sun exposure and not really thoughtful planning. His eyes though, seemed to always lose somewhere and they didn’t hold the same grip and intensity they used to, at times they seemed troubled, other times desperate and somehow defeated without a fight. Everything else was almost the same, especially the distinct moles under his right eye¾his trademark. But something in his posture seemed to have been lost through the years as well. He might have been hanging in there, but not without a couple of falls on the way. Not that he’d ever speak about any of them¾ not because he didn’t want to, only he didn’t know how to.

Despite everything, he wanted more of the reflection in the mirror; he knew that whatever manifested on the surface, didn’t express what resided within fully. He could guess he still managed to clasp hard on keeping everything within himself, biting his tongue and trying to let go.

Mutsuki lowered his gaze at his shoulders, getting ready to fix …that.

“You will have to keep your neck relaxed for me because I’ll shift it once in a while, hope you don’t mind. I won’t experiment too much on you; the usual undercut will do.”

After combed his wet hair on one side¾which looked longer close up¾ he held the razor on his mouth for a moment before he positioned the comb and the bundle of hair he was going to work with through it. His movements were light but thoughtful, and he occasionally moved his head according to his needs. There wasn’t much talking on the way, their breaths were enough of a conversations to echo through the entire room.  At times their eyes would meet on the mirror, before Mutsuki broke the gaze and concentrated back. His breaths were steady and warm against his neck, and sometimes he bit on his lip to concentrate. The sound of the snipping scissors, more breathing against his ear, wet hair combing, humming, his hand exerting a light pressure when moving the head. Almost two hours had passed since he got to work, and after brushing the cut hair out of the way, he stepped back and gave a look at the end results. You could already see the proud look on his face before he lowered his head near his and held his gaze back at the mirror.

“Welcome back lost Uri, you’ve been missed. “ That came out almost as a whisper, as if the Urie that he was used to looking at every day had just woken up from hibernation and needed some time to adjust to the space. His personal hairdresser now, patted him on the shoulder to actually wake him up and looked at him as he rose on his feet, brushed off just a few bundles of hair off his shoulder, and parted his hair to reveal his forehead.

“Wow… you really are back.”

“You’re actually good at this.” He got a rather serious kick in the shoulder.

“Dumbass, questioning me like this! At least I won’t look at you pained for a while now, what a relief! I’d suggest you hop in the shower, you’ll shed like a cat. You have everything you need there.” He cleaned the mess, collected his tools, and left the room with a smirk before he could say anything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> on today's episode of "Let's avoid ch 179 like the plague": Mucchan does gods work and gets rid of urie's current hairstyle bc ... yeah   
> ( hmu on twitter @mucchanko_ bc i scream about them sometimes there, yeah, hope you enjoyed this :") )


	3. Guests

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Let's just say a kitchen is not the best place to leave Aura and Urie alone. :')

Aura and Ayumu occasionally came to visit if they had to work on any new mission or simply out of boredom on their far-between houses. Mutsuki's house was a rather convenient place for gatherings and certainly living up to that special class life. They both managed to bring some things to come up with a decent lunch. Aura was pretty busy being oppressed in the kitchen by Mucchan because of a particular time he almost burnt it. Thus now he was only responsible for dish washing and anything but being near food and fire-something he should always keep an eye on himself. Ayumu was trying to give heart to Aura with random reassuring smiles when he could take a break, while sipping on her tea.

A rich and resonant voice dispersed from the end of the corridor which indicated that Urie was still alive after taking a bone-melting shower and he was probably complaining about not being used to “the country style” bathroom.

“Oi Mutsuki, something is leaking ,and I don’t think it should be. Come have a look.” City boys.

Aura went through the second heart attack today, after almost breaking something while he was barely breathing, and Ayumu might have mildly choked on the last sip of the tea she was enjoying so deliciously. Aura was pretty familiarized with his tone when things didn’t go his way; Urie had been his mentor long enough to know that. Not ideal.

Hopping out of the shower, which took no more than twenty minutes, he grabbed one of the towels to dry himself, dressed up-well, covered some things which didn’t include his entire upper body-and only kept one towel over his shoulders. Walking into the kitchen unconsciously half naked, he was caught off guard by the visitors, whose eyes now were wandering on him.

“Never mind, I” he had to pause a moment to acquaint his eyes with the sudden visitors. “fixed it. Umm, Shinsanpei, good afternoon, and …?” He turned his sight on the other woman.

“Ayumu Hogi, nice to meet you! You must be Urie. “ She bowed. He gave her a polite nod.

“I think you’d do all of us a favor if you put something on, won’t you?” Mutsuki was really trying to maintain that formally friendly face while equally being embarrassed by his really graphically “loud” , um…colleague. It took a while for Urie to bring back to his memory that he was pretty exposed, as he gazed down to his chest.

“Ah, yeah, sorry ‘bout that. I’ll be back in a bit.”  And out he goes. Aura had a lot of questions, but smelled danger on tacking them; he might as well live the calm life of shutting up. Definitely.

Urie was back with the wind, and decently looking. And lunch was ready. Pork belly udon. Edible food that doesn’t reduce your life expectancy by a decade. Excellent.

”There’s this old lady that’s also my neighbor for almost four years now, and she keeps sending me fresh vegetables and fruits while I’m at work ,and I don’t know what to do with them since there’s always so many. Her husband and only son were murdered on a ghoul attack, and now she lives alone. I feel like she has almost made me her child at this point; she always sends me food that I’m really grateful for, but I don’t really know who to share it with. And it’s really nice to have you come over, I was always so used to living in a noisy house that coming here was almost a shock. Thank you for coming and let’s dig in, shall we?”

“Thank you for the meal!” said all of them simultaneously.

“I recently heard you were promoted as a Special Class Investigator. That’s really impressive. Congratulations!” encouraged Ayumu.

 “ Ahh, thank you!” , however his amusement of this topic was faint and died out really quickly. He preferred to keep work away from home as much as he could.

“Maybe we should celebrate this, hm? “ Not the first time Urie has been thinking about this either, but he’d prefer to rather celebrate his existence than promotion.

“Umm, it’s fine really. “ He gave an apologetic smile before he slurped on his last noodles.

“That was really delicious.” Aura had been served his share of almost starvation during this time, so it was a godsend to taste that. Urie was the first to leave the table.

“I’ll fix the kitchen, I did come late to help around so…”

“It’s fine, I’ll help too.” Aura couldn’t afford his superior to steal the one job he knew how to do in this house.

 

While Mucchan was busy helping Ayumu tie her hair  up before they could start with some warm up for the training, Urie and Aura were busy with… interrogating. Each other. After a tense silence of ten minutes trying not to accidentally touch while washing the dishes, someone had to crack it. It’s worth mentioning it was completely unnecessary to have two grown ass men to deal with the kitchen, but here they were.

“Quick question, why are you here?” It had been years since Urie had last practiced the bossy attitude on him and it didn’t seem to have been washed away after so long either. Muscle memory.

“I’d ask you the same thing since I live 20 minutes away while you most probably had to take the train for a couple hour ride.” Not that Aura would leave it at that.

“I don’t have to explain myself to my underling.” It did take Urie a while during the times in the chateau to tame his violent tendencies when certain things didn’t go his way, but it felt he was about to kick the bucket there and then.

“I’m not your underling; I work under Tooru’s squad.”

“You’re still a junior.”

“Tch.”

“Tch.”

After an hour of silent treatment and …more silent treatment they finished their duties and it was time to leave, which didn’t leave Aura without questioning why this guy hadn’t got lost already. Maybe because of some reason in the lines of “he’ll stay the weekend and came specifically to see Tooru” ? Nah.

“By the way, you room is right in front of mine if you want to settle your things.”

_Settle your things._

He’s definitely staying the weekend and came specifically to see Tooru. He couldn’t say he didn’t leave without turning his head back a couple of times, as If he’d get a better insight on their plans on the way. He should just go home and take a highly deserved nap for not breaking anything in the past two hours. That should boost his confidence for the while.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> bet ya never thought you'd ever get domestic aura and urie interaction, but i only come to please here so you can thank me later :')


	4. Geborgenheit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just grab the tissues, that's it, grab the tissues

 

If you were to ask Urie of what an out -of-body experience would be like for him, he might first give you the weird looks because it probably hasn’t ever landed on his mind previously. He might try to ponder over it, but it’s sometimes hard to imagine your own eyes look at the real you; not the reversed twin, no calculated expressions, no expectations.

Maybe an out of body experience for him would be to not be such a faithful servant of his tendencies. But, yet again, he can’t know for certain whether his tendencies were the ones to make him go through this “out of body experience”. Not that he trusts himself too much on this or anything. But it’s exhausting to chew on words for days, months; rolling them from one side of the mouth to the other, almost deaf from the crunch of each solidified word, heavy. There will come a time when a bite becomes a loaf and a loaf turns into a gigantic mass of regret, like a child who chews seven gums at the same time, bubble gun sweet on the tongue, but acrid and metallic down the throat. Cramping jaws. It tears your insides apart, and maybe, just maybe, you could consider spitting it out. And then, you do, and words disperse like bubble and fume through your teeth, the mass that exhausted you for days was but a joke; it evaporates from your mouth like it never weighed down on you. And you just let it go. And then rewind. What a joke, indeed.

~  
Now that Mutsuki was taking care of some paperwork, he could sit down on the wooden veranda that specifically caught his eye when he arrived, and chew some words up before they go down. For all you could notice, the sky was fragmented on little bits that fit the spaces between branches, squeezing sunrays of the setting sun in. The sky was bleeding purple and every speck of sky left exposed was a different nuance, as if the sky wasn’t one, but random broken pieces coming together, to somehow make some sense. The walking experience around the antiquated trees was more challenging than expected since stones made up much of the ground around them, and he could live without a sprained ankle or two.

  
The array of lanterns lit above his head reminded him of the times Ha-, Kaneki “forced” them as a squad to go to firework festivals because” it would serve well for the squad dynamic”. He puffed an amused breath out before he grabbed his sketchbook again. Maybe he could remember how they all felt before Haise left ,and just maybe he could spill that in paper. And maybe he could try to remember how much brighter Mutsuki’s smile was like before certain events whitewashed his hair and corroded some of his soul out, before the Auction Raid, before Shirazu “stole” his precious squad leader role from him, before…  
He chuckled again.

Adorable kids.

  
“Weirdly enough, you’re amused. What happened?“ His sudden voice cracked the silence and he was spooked for just a moment. Mutsuki might or might have not seen him grin at himself for the past ten minutes, but he would understand if he told him. If he told him.  
“Weirdly enough, I got a weird taste in my mouth of that black bean soup I hated that Shirazu forced me to drink just because he was promoted squad leader.“

Although six years had flew away since he passed, the mention of his name still leaves a weird taste on their mouth, a mixture of acerbity and honey sweet homesickness. They missed him and his peculiar piercings and his madcap, loudmouthed ass, and how he nudged Mutsuki off the chair in reassurance when he told him he felt useless and weak, and how he always blamed Urie’s edginess for every scratch he got in his new motorcycle and how he smelled like benzene and death every time he pained. They did. And it sprinkled a sad, but comforting silence around them. And that, it was fine. That they could remember him how they wished to.

  
“I’m sorry I couldn’t say goodbye when you left. I’m sorry I couldn’t say anything at all. (I’m sorry I never said anything.) “The words seeped out of his mouth unconsciously. He squeezed his thumb as if to remind himself where he was.

Gulp.

Shiver.

  
Mutsuki raised his eyes from his hands and seemed to have been caught off guard.  
“I-, we all miss you a lot.” He had to finish what he started, it was already half way.” I miss you a lot. And we…we want to lend you our strength as well. It must have been hard, moving all alone somewhere you don’t know, and loneliness doesn’t really help either.  
“After you changed squad, before the Dragon operation, I wanted to talk to you…Hell, I even went to Kuroiwa’s wedding just to catch up with you because you were moving so fast I .. just couldn’t reach you. And I couldn’t say anything yet again. And after the wedding, I became more and more anxious. You wanted to talk too, I could see, but I was really afraid of what you were going to say. And I brushed you off. I’m sorry I was never able to say anything.  
“Before the Auction Raid, since my father passed, I was terrified and alone and …angry because I was a second choice; he didn’t die accidentally in a mission, he died so the rest could live. And so I learned to try to live for myself, just because he couldn’t live for me. I hated him as much as I looked up to him. Everyone to me now was a passerby, a stranger, soon to die in a matter of time, so I wouldn’t lose anyone if I had no one to lose. I yeaned for a family I could call my own, no make belief, no playing house, a true home, but I convinced myself I couldn’t possibly have one, and so I despised everyone who did.  
“During the Auction Raid, I shattered from the burden in had put myself under, and I hurt you on the way. But you let me know that I wasn’t suffering alone, and that I could count on someone for once in my life, and that I was enough. I was a child in need for a pat in the back, and you weren’t in a better position either, but I seemed to have regained consciousness because of you. I’m grateful still.”

His palms were sweaty, but his lips still managed to curl up into a smile.

  
“Rueshima’s operation was when I thought I had lost you. I knew your capabilities, but I could have never guessed how much it would have messed you up. And I was late. After you appeared, i was relieved, and i couldn’t think of anything else besides going home. I guess I just didn’t want you to be in danger again, and you hadn’t visited in so long. Saiko and everyone, we all wanted to rely on you.  
“During dragon, I had let you down. I should have stopped you when I saw everything was not going fine. I was hiding behind the squad leader position trying to please everyone, but that hurt you even more, so much that you almost took you own life. I cursed myself. I was scared again, more anxious than ever. Useless. Pathetic. I used work as a distraction, an addiction of some sort, and that drew me further away from the most important things. And at times I don’t think much has changed.”

Both their eyes were piercing the floor.  
He knew his hands were shaking and his throat was working too hard to stop him from breathing and the knot on his stomach had come back with a blast, and that he-

  
“I don’t know what I’d do if something bad happened to you. If you had died back then, I would have been heartbroken. I wanted to apologize because I couldn’t live with it, and it still won’t be too easy to think about it, but at least I could speak up for once and let you know you can lean back on me as much as I’ve leaned on you.”

  
He got the strength to look him in the eye, and ignore the anxiety assault him every breathing moment he tries to talk about it. He was able to let him know in his own way. His speech wasn’t fluent, his tongue urged to tie itself up many times during the time, he pass a couple of breaths, but he was able to tell him.  
Mutsuki flicked his gaze down to his feet, and hugged his knees closer before he blurred out something.  
“Do you want to know the real reason why I decided to move out?”

  
Pause. He was scared again.

  
“I couldn’t live with the memory of everything I had done. I couldn’t look you, or Saiko, or Kaneki, in the eye knowing I had caused you so much suffering. I was ashamed; I wanted to disappear. I still wasn’t able to talk to Kaneki. He has a daughter, and I can’t meet her or Touka without reminding myself of the exhaustion and stress I put her in. That time when I wanted to kill myself, I had pondered over it for months. I was too blinded pursuing something I couldn’t have-and didn’t really need-, that I lost everything that i had to begin with. I hated everything that I was, and what kept me alive somehow until then was the times we spent as a squad.  
“I didn’t have a happy childhood, nor a loving family and that was the only thing I could consider precious to me. The reason I thought I loved Kaneki was because I was never shown genuine concern by any man in my life up until that point. I was merely an object to manipulate and entertain. But then he left with no explanation, and I was clueless, scared…and then Torso happened and I felt like breaking any moment. I wanted to forget where I came from, and start anew, but that place brought back everything I used to hate myself for. I lost touch with many things, I was blinded by my own blades, and I stared to believe I had lost you and Saiko as well. That infuriated me, further convincing me that I didn’t deserve nor was it humanly possible for me to ever have someone love me. I wanted to take some burden off myself and leave it to randomness to decide, like those passengers that are convinced they want to leave, but will only do so if it rains on a rainy week. If I really wanted to pass, I’d only do so if you two stopped me from hurting Touka. And you did.  
“I had thought a lot about leaving as well, and when no one tried to stop me, I thought I really deserved to disappear. And maybe it was for the best if I left, I wouldn’t be able to realize some things that I now know for certain. But,-“  
His lips were quivering and his voice tremulous; he was really trying hard to fight down a sob that left him breathless. His throat felt like exploding, like a life sized ghost of emotions was about to make its way out, his fingers bloodless white and burning from a fierce grip of his shirt. Tears had already met down his shaky chin and they rolled down his neck, hot and rushing. He tried to turn on his side and find his eyes to meet, which were ready.  
“I’m so lonely, you see, and it is not lovely, or fancy, or therapeutic. It’s not.. ideal.” He managed a wretched smile that screamed anything but happiness. It was malnourished and barely hanging in there as well.  
“I always called myself stupid for ever imagining myself around a family of my own, because I knew that terrified me to the bone. I knew what was the worst that could happen in a family, I could either be the toy or the owner. But even then, even on moments where I do nothing but sabotage my own happiness, I think I deserve to feel a glimpse of comfort somewhere, and a huge house alienated from the world can give you anything but that. At days I felt I deserved better, others I just numbed myself to work until I passed out, because I couldn’t bear to consciously come home to and empty house. I just-  
His hot laborious breathes weren’t dissolving in the cool breeze anymore, it was something similar to a body close to his that managed to catch the heat of his body back at him, there was a hand resting on his head that massaged his scalp, and another hand brought him closer to the chest, there was a shoulder where he could drown his whimpers on. And he could feel a set of eyes drip on his back as well, and the chest was quivering like a newborn baby...it was a natural response of the damaged to reach out for their own species, right? He wanted to evaporate right there and then, but that meant the quivering chest would collapse on the floor without a place to lean. He could only rest his head near the nape of his neck and feel his fresh undercut pierce his skin. He could only do as much. And he wanted to believe it was enough. _Baby steps._

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here i was thinking i wouldn't write angsty shit, but i love me some angsty shit so who am i kidding :')


	5. That which was found

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Wait, i don't remember making these..."  
> "(Wow he really needs some rest) That's because i made them..."  
> "Oh, right..."

His head was buzzing hot and it felt like his brain was being boiled. It was probably morning, but the light dispersing through his window was dim and gray. A sharp pulsing sensation pierced through his eyes and through the back of his head. The sound of the rain hitting the tiles resonated around the room and penetrated his headspace, something that didn’t go well with his already pounding head from the awkward sleep he managed to get. He didn’t bother moving for another couple of minutes after waking up; he needed to lay awake for a moment and recollect everything. Although his head now was heavy, his mouth at least was relieved; he could tick that much out of the bucket list. Cautiously, as if trying to prevent his head from cracking to pieces, he pushed himself out of bed.

It felt like walking on mined lands, but it was weirdly relieving, their talk. The next thing he knew, Mutsuki was dozing on his shoulders, unconscious to the dissolved emotions soaking his cheeks, vulnerable to winds and storms, but at least he could shield him; he was on time; he could lend his shoulder and warm his limbs and provide cushion for his glassy body to not further break, because he was there and he would stay. He would damn himself if he let him slip like sand again off his hand, at least for now he could hold him and feel his body weight on his ,and his shy breaths escape his slightly opened mouth ,and his petite shivers of his torso form the breeze cutting through his back and his whimpers of discomfort form the uncomfortable position he was sleeping in. Just like that he hopped him on his back and put him to bed. The trace of oppressed emotions had occupied the edge of his eyes and down they sank under his skin. The pacific hours of darkness engulfed the crack of light escaping from outside, as he closed the door behind him.

The rain was lighter than the tiles made it out to be, although it was chill enough to send goose bumps all over his skin. Mutsuki seemed to have been up for quite a while now, already immersed into paperwork, yes, in the kitchen table. Once in a while he would tilt his specs, sip on his coffee, type something quickly on his laptop, probably contemplate some life choices of the “why did he let this report due to the last minute” sort, type some more and then be completely spooked by Urie groggily, soundless like a phantom, entering the room while throwing some sleepy, confused and judgmental looks at him.

“Why..” He sat down on the chair with a bang. “are you doing…” And sipped some of his coffee and kinda let gravity and his tired arm put it back on place not too friendly. “paperwork at eight o’clock?? Don’t you special class folks ever take a breather when you have days off? (Okay, but specs suit him)”

“I can’t believe Urie Kuki is looking down on me for working. Where did your eagerness to finish paperwork go?” Tease o’clock is right around the corner.

“Down the drain the moment I started teaching.” He rubbed rather harshly some sleep off of his face and proceeded with the complains of the morning.  “I can’t believe Kaneki did it with a smile on his face and didn’t lose patience once? And dealt with paperwork? And us? And the house? I would have slapped me in the face too if I had an underlings similar to what I used to be. That’s an understatement. ”

“Bold of you to assume you’ve changed much though.” He muttered before he averted his eyes back to the screen trying to not lose seriousness. He sipped more of his coffee and came back to typing.

“Saiko turns in papers faster than I do. I don’t know myself anymore.”

“Woow, I really should come visit more often.”

“My point exactly!” Despite being on the verge of falling back asleep right there and then, he managed to dramatically throw his hands in agreement as a means of emphasizing his point. Yeah, he definitely was sleepy and confused.

After familiarizing himself with Mutsuki’s routine of making coffee, he grabbed a mug and poured some of what he had prepared for him. Their morning was a mixture of surprisingly comfortable silence, Urie’s mighty yawns, peaceful coffee sipping, and more Urie stealing a glance from a really concentrated Mutsuki who was entirely zoomed out. Or maybe shameless, demanding staring at the guy until he noticed him. He now was resting his head on his hand with already awake eyes studying all his small movements of slight distress and concentration. More details.

“You know, for a person who has partially screwed over eyes, you shouldn’t look this good on glasses, just saying. “ Now this. Not that he knew what he was thinking being this obviously crushing over, but he had to do it someday. It’s not that he hadn’t been crushing over him for the past couple years.

“I swear I’ll splash your own coffee on your face for distracting me, just saying.” But he was totally betrayed by his really obviously flustered face and constantly sipping on an empty mug. He had been typing nonstop for the past thirty minutes, until he stopped doing so, gave a puff of relief and got up in a rush.

“I’ll head to the headquarter to finish some other work and hopefully, I’ll be back in an hour. Make yourself at home, and by that I mean, ideally, don’t try to cook if you haven’t tried it before. Aura experimented once and it ended in flames.So, yeah. See ya! “After putting on his shoes, he grabbed the car keys and left with a blast.

Urie’s waving hand had practically frozen on the air together with his slightly agape mouth and even more puzzled face upon witnessing the man fidgeting around the house trying to find his scattered belongings, throw death stares at the clock every now and then in distress, almost break a leg from trying to put on shoes within point one seconds, and finally making his way out. And his kitchen almost burned once because of Aura. His brain was usually shrunken in the morning, however, even if he ran on full potential, it would have still been too much to fit in all that information in a span of five minutes in the fellow behind his eyes. He gulped down the remaining coffee and tried to think of a way to kill some time alone.  

The rain was pounding harder against the wooden veranda, but there had been some reserved space for the concealed sun rays to penetrate the sky to his feet, giving them a tingle of warmth. Nonetheless, it was still chilly enough to make his nose a little runny. The country rain wasn’t to the slightest close to the Tokyo rain. Tokyo rain was oppressing, obnoxious, generic; the rain here had no purpose of blending out the sound of civilization, because all the little human contribution here blended perfectly well with the sound of the rain. Rainy Tokyo reeked of Saiko’s peculiar facemask “only for rainy days”, street food and earthy gasoline; a rainy day here possessed more of a rich pungent smell of dampness and growth.

Maybe he should have just stuck to laying around sketching his time away¾ living the parasite life he could never succeed to live in Tokyo¾, but he decided to get some brain cells activated on the way and make some sandwiches .They had lived for almost three years under the same roof and he never got the chance to prepare something that he liked with his wretched culinary skills. He was aware of his preferences more or less, so he could at least try.

Opening the fridge, he searched for the ingredients he needed ,and he concluded that he sure had a lot of food for a single person to eat. That actually pushed him to visit more often. It goes without saying that he liked eating accompanied as much as he did and Saiko maybe won’t mind if he was absent more frequently when work allowed him to breathe. She had enough ducklings to take care of, she probably wouldn’t notice his occasional absence too much. Collecting all that he needed, which didn’t end up much, he soft boiled two eggs, peeled them, smashed then on a pot and added just a little mayonnaise to make a homogenous mixture to spread on each loaf of bread. He didn’t really remember whether he added any other fancy thing, but he seemed to have some turkey ham so he might as well just add that too. A detail that went without notice when he first saw him prepare it was how he just cut the borders of the bread like that because “it looks neat”; it was personal choice however, and he would follow with no question asked. That didn’t take too long, and he had quite some time to fill up already, so he lost his head in the shower for twenty minutes which still wasn’t enough for him to come home. What was left to do was just grab the sketchbook again and sit outside somewhere his butt wouldn’t drench.

Zooming out on everything around, he had been enough immersed in scribbling to not notice a short old lady approach him, and only managed to raise his head up when she made her remarks.

“Fufu, who is the handsome gentlemen visiting Toorucchi for so long? And you seem to not live around here either. I’m his neighbor, you can call me Aika-san. “ Said she light-heartedly. She was a soft-spoken lady with  a serene demeanor¾something granted from the time on her shoulders.

“(Toorucchi?!)U-uh, Hello! I’m Urie Kuki, pleased to meet you.” He blurted out confused as he bowed.

“Fufu, such a polite child. “ She left a wrapped boxed on his hands and excused herself to sit down there as well. “It’s nice to have new people visit him; two colleagues of his visit most of the time when he’s even so rarely home, and all the other times he’s working until late. Tell me son, what are you to him?”

“(Friend? Comrade? Teammate? Lo-) Uhh, I’m a colleague from Tokyo where he used to live. We have worked together for a while.” Her face light up as an amused muffled laugh escaped her pursed lips.

“What’s the matter?”

“Fufu, you look so noble you almost reminded me of my husband when he was young.” To which Urie couldn’t respond in any way without letting just a little remaining shyness escape.

“Tell him to drink this just before he goes to sleep. Take care of Toorucchi for me ,will you?”  As she rose on her feet, which signaled Urie to do the same out of politeness, she patted his shoulder twice before she threw small steps away.

“Y-yes…”

Just as he landed the package on the table, he heard someone struggle against the door before it swung open and a wild, partially drenched Mucchan made his way inside who, mind you, didn’t seem to have had the best time of his life checking in on work on a weekend, but he was still able to stand on his feet perfectly fine. However, his drained eyes seemed to have already been filled up with excitement and shimmer the moment he saw the sandwiches on the table, a perfect timing to his already hollow stomach.

“Wait, I don’t remember making these…”

“(wow, he really needs some rest) That’s because i made them…”

“Oh, right…” It has to be emphasized how his face of previous childlike anticipation was replaced by a reluctant expression of lip pressing together and a twisted mouth as he recalled the last time he tasted Urie’s cooking. He could not hold the dramatic face for long before cracking up at Urie’s chippy reaction on his suggestive expression though. What a thin-skinned boy!

“Thank you Uri, I’ll eat them deliciously!” In point one seconds he was able to crack Urie’s annoyance with a bright striking giggle that was such a rare antique of his, he wished he could freeze it in time  He only hoped his sun burn was still visible to conceal his cheeks betraying him.

“Oh, a lady came by and gave me this package. She told me you should drink this before you sleep. Are you okay though?” His concern was show on his already curved up eyebrow.

“I’m fiiiine, I just struggle to sleep sometimes, but it’s nothing to worry about. I will need to thank her later; she’s always so generous with me. “With a relieved sigh from one less errand to run for that day, he left to change into something that allowed him to breathe before they sat down outside.

The sun was visible now, but there were still remaining cloud that concealed the sky, which barely allowed enough warmth to reach out to the ground. The smell of wet soil was more piercing than ever.

“Okay, now it’s time for the taste test. Hope I don’t die.” He side eyed an Urie whose eyes were already sparkling with a shy anticipation.

“(why are you so dramatic?!) Of course you won’t die!” He savored the first bite look up the sky as if he’d find the taste of that somewhere there.

“Woh, it’s tasty!”  It was almost a whisper, his meek comment, before eagerly digging in  on the second bite. He looked like a child who was finally rewarded with their favorite candy, and he wished he could preserve the tranquility of this moment from all the trouble and vice. They were both too absorbed in eating to notice a feline friend rubbing its body against their legs however, which didn’t catch Mutsuki by surprise, because it seemed to be familiar with him.

“Look who’s baack!” His exclaim was as delightful as one of a child. After bending down to stroke its head, he weighed him up and pampered him on his lap. He made a long purr before sitting its head on its paws.

“This is Mr.Calico, and he’s a stray cat that wanders around here once in a while. He’s a spoiled little fellow that wants to eat and cuddle all the time. Here” He tried to turn his lap on Urie just to avoid interrupting his comfort. ”You can pet him.”

Urie didn’t really have any good experiences with pets in his life, or didn’t really have any pets to begin with, so his hand was pretty hesitant on making a contact. It felt as if it would disturb its steady breathing and relaxed posture if it felt an unfamiliar hand touch. But Mutsuki didn’t let him ponder anymore on that, grabbing his strong but refined hand and letting him relax it on his apricot black head. It let out a dragged meow before it went back to silently resting.

“Calico males are so rare though, it’s a surprise he exists let alone wander around homeless. He keeps my company whenever I’m not on duty and he’s another reason I’m still sane after all. “ His glassy green eyes  were caressing the small creature preciously, their gaze tender on his fur. He swore he had engraved each and every detail in his memory, everything¾the chilling breeze, the fluffy sensation of its fur against his leg, the weight of Mutsuki’s hand on his, his face lighting up while eating, all his features emphasized by the occasional rays of light¾he couldn’t let this slip behind the back of his head.

“Would you like to go on a trip tomorrow? It’s Sunday so no one will bug from work, hopefully.” There was a place he had been dying to visit around this area, a nemophila field around an hour away from there by train, but he never found someone he could go with, and it would be just depressing to see such beauty alone. Maybe Urie wouldn’t mind as much.

“Alright, where to?”

“I’ll tell you tomorrow. You’ll see.” After letting the small feline escape his lap, he got up clumsily and dumped Urie with lots of animated emotions he couldn’t put a name on, but they all seemed to helplessly sweep the man off his feet more and more, and he undeniably was loving every bit of it.

 

Later that night, his itch to grab the pencil was more urging than ever, because he was able to finally find some of the lost pieces of memories he couldn’t recall in years; he was able to label his emotions in a way he could comprehend, and not allow them to wander aimlessly stirring up his thoughts. He could remember his profound smile without the reflexive respond of a shaky hand thinking it might have been disfigured in time. It was there, uncorrupted and vigorous, a hidden gem in need of a rockhound to preserve it well.

Maybe he wasn’t too willing to expose his drabbles to him just yet¾ they were unpolished, unrefined¾ but his mind had already swirled freefalling into sleep, as his arm had failed him in putting the sketchbook away, and as drowsy as his arm and limbs were at that moment, had remained wide opened on the floor, together with an opened sketchbook on the side.

And maybe Mutsuki could have very well woken him up lightly from a sleep that would probably give him a sore body and throat the next day, but his warmth deprived body fought against reason and in the fraction of a second decided to situate his head on his opened arm and only naturally take a fetal position. He wanted to dissolve in him, amalgamate their drowsy bodies in one, but something kept his from making contact with his skin. He wasn’t sure why, but he decided to be but a witness at that moment. He really wanted to feel the gentle warmth of his’s lips on his forehead, but for now he decided to not answer to that  desperate need just yet. He could only observe how his milky skin, nose, relaxed lips, chin, neck contrasted with the darkness curving around them. He could only admire, observe, collect and recollect.

  It wasn’t comfortable, or ideal, or warm to say the least, but he could at least imagine he came back to someone waiting for him, he could dare to call this empty shell of a house a home for once and he wouldn’t feel the sharp piece of reality check penetrate him, at least just for a little longer. It wasn’t ideal, but it felt like home again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the fact that the old lady calls mucchan toorucchi cleanses my face and warms my heart;;;  
> thank you so much for reading and i always appreciate your kudos/comments you guys :')


	6. Clotting Blood

  
Diamond clear beads of freshwater clinging on the edge of one tile reflected timid beams of light through the undisturbed air and straight to Urie’s eyes, cracking some consciousness into his being. The first thing that welcomed him back to his awake hours was a stiff neck and numb feet; the second was a blanket he didn’t really remember throwing on himself preventing his breathing,(he didn’t even remember how he fell asleep like that), and the third…the gentle grip of a hand on his shirt and the owner of that hand engulfed by his arm, cushioned near him, teasing his neck with tranquil breaths. A sweet lavender scent oozing from him filled up his nostrils and rushed down his lungs leaving behinds traces of buds of florals about to bloom down the way and an ecstatic sensation on each nerve end on his body. He felt the texture of his longer than usual green hair in between his fingers, he wanted to wrap the scars on his body in silk, cover him in hydrangea petals and blow the ashes of his worries away together with the wind. Safe and sound. Always.

  
The beams of light managed to penetrate through Mutsuki’s eyelids as well, who gave a whiny whimper before he let some light in. He could feel the weight of Urie’s arm around his shoulders and head, but he didn’t raise his gaze just yet, he only saw his own hand gripping on his shirt, and felt a wave of heat overcome his cheeks looking at Urie’s amused grin on him. Without much pondering, he unconsciously brought his body closer the moment Mutsuki locked eye with him, and didn’t fail to get a leg and arms thrown around him as a response. As two people who casually decided to sleep on the damned veranda, they felt weirdly warm and Mutsuki too wondered where did the blanket pop out from.  
“Did you bring the blanket?” Asked Mutsuki with a lazy undertone voice.  
“I thought you did?”  
“Well damn then, it must have been Aika-san.”  
“You mean the woman that came by the other day?... That was uhh, not ideal.” The moment he heard her name he quickly recollected their small conversation and how much a “colleague” he was to him, and how awkward it would be to run on her again. She would understand. Definitely. Just as unconsciously, he brushed some green bangs off of his forehead before giving him a light forehead kiss, as if he could feel it were deprived of any. Responsively, he got a playful bite in the nose followed by a peck. What a tease.

  
“Good morning!”  
“Oh no, I don’t plan on waking up. It’s been months since I had quality sleep like this, I want to enjoy it just a little more.”And he pretended to go back to sleep grumpily nuzzling up his neck.  
“What, do you usually sleep under rocks? Aren’t you sore or something? My neck is killing me.”  
“Shut up, I’m sore too but that’s not the point.” He mumbled under his breath pulling him closer. On that moment, he realized he’d promised Urie to take him on a trip today and it almost slipped his mind considering how comfortable the set up of the moment was. At that moment he rushed up suddenly which left Urie perplexed.  
“Okay forget that, hop up, we’ll go where I promised you yesterday. There’s this place only an hour ride by train form here, it’s, ummm, a nemophila garden, and they are already bloomed around this time so it would be perfect to visit.”  
“It’s a date then? “ He was convinced he’d make him say it one of these days; he would be patient though, enjoying all his small moments of stubbornness and denial.  
“Whatever you want to call it, just pack something fast so we can get there within the morniiing.”What a flustered man.

  
After getting back on their two feel, that’s when they felt their entire muscles throb with soreness as they gave a simultaneous groan of relief.  
“Let us not try that again.”  
“Let us not.”  
After running the usual morning errands in top speed, they managed to get dressed, packed some food and off they went. Urie wore something probably too heavy for a sunny day and Mutsuki dressed in something too light for an unpredictable weather that wouldn’t really suit well with his already sore muscles, but they still managed to look handsome nonetheless. Urie went with a plain stripped shirt, a leathered jacket and black jeans, whereas Mutsuki went with a loose sleeved pastel blue dress shirt and skinny jeans., and he also managed to put his hair, that was had grown slightly longer, in a small messy bun leaving behind some bangs. It’s safe to say having always seen each other on formal wear and bloody soaked coats, it left both of them a bit dazzled witnessing each other express some individuality on their clothing and they managed to steal some glances here and there before heading off.

  
Walking back to the road covered in cherry blossoms they reached the train station and hopped in for another ride somewhere near nowhere. They had taken a silent seat gazing at the view on the clear windows, blurred in motion. Randomly and hurriedly, catching Mutsuki by surprise, he hopped on the opposite seat. As an outsider, you could infer he almost looked like the little kids who want to try out every possible seat on the train. He, in fact, wanted to let some nonchalance escape, something he thought he’d lost, damn sometimes not even acquired as a kid to begin with.  
“Okay, you’ll do me a weird favor. Can you look at any direction for 30 minutes without moving?”  
“Wait what? Why?”  
“Just do what I say and don’t speak until I tell you to. Don’t move at all.”  
“O-okay?” It didn’t take long for him to realize his plotting and automatically raise his awkwardness bars up there when he took the sketchbook out and scribbled something really fast, something similar to a setup. He tried to ignore his calculating, almost endless stares. It wasn’t his usual composed, listeners face; it had a slight hint of frustration and eagerness as if his muse would evaporate from his sight at any moment. The movement of his wrist over the paper were nimble and precise, his pencil fast and thoughtful. At times, the contact of the pencil with the rough paper was strong and determined, other times it smoothly caressed it, detaching occasionally while he averted his eyes back at him and tried to squeeze as much of him in his eyes as he could. What would he do, indeed, if something bad happened to him? He could never visually devour someone else and feel the same fulfillment artistically and emotionally as he did with him, he would never feel the sizzling warmth melt his insides after every finished work from fondness and need, anything in paper would be a mediocre lookalike of him, lifeless and frozen. Cropped film. Anachronic.

  
The small man was already cramped so he sneakily tried to adjust his neck slowly…gradually…trying to bring it back to its senses, winning some time when Urie dived back to his sketch. Urie could not let him breathe just yet though, he was almost done.. He grabbed the pencil on his teeth, reached his sculpted arm out, cupped his face not too gently to say the least, and directed it the way it was previously cramped in, suffering.  
“ I said don’t move. I won’t take too long.”  
“….Scary.” He was already rubbing the prints of his firm fingers away from his face as something similar to a pout formed around his lips. Giving the finishing touches, he erased some unnecessary lines and then held his sketchbook in perspective. His face was exceptionally satisfied and occasionally shared that satisfaction locking sights with the boy in front of him.  
“Okay, done. You can breathe now. “  
“Thanks a lot, I was already cramped all over, now my neck is kinda failing on me too. The least you could do is show me what I cramped for.”  
“No way! I can give you a neck massage if you want, but you’ll need to wait until you see that.”  
“What kind of work conditions are these…”Just as he felt his whiny tone peak its head through the surface of his voice, which poked Urie edginess to say something, he restricted himself however, and decided to cut it by laying his furnace warm hands on his shoulders and drawing firm circles deep on his skin, which may or may not have sent an unpredicted twitch down his lower back. An antiquated, innate response stemming from dark days leaked drops of wariness and apprehension on the surface of his consciousness; he felt an urge to shake the unnamed hands away. It was instinctive, an unsolicited gift. But he didn’t feel malice on any of the moves of his fingers. They were massaging all the right muscles well, firm but satisfying, warm but refreshing. He almost felt ashamed on the slight alertness his body went through. It was Urie after all, what was he thinking?!  
“Hey, you okay? Should I stop?” And it was obvious enough to reach his senses. He almost felt like wanting to disappear. Conscious-stricken.  
“Ahah I’m okay, I was just absent minded for a moment.” He noticed the color of his face was slightly washed, although he forced a short lived titter, and his expression resembled one of witnessing an apparition. Urie felt he should maybe ask about it, but filled with reluctance, he just reached his hand out in anticipation waiting for the response of a hand willing to intertwine with his, and it did. Fingers squeezed back. They were going to be alright.  
It was already time to land on their highly anticipated destination. Detraining on the train station, they had to walk for just a little more until they made their way into the entrance of what would seem like an enormous fairy like forest of ivory and ancient trees, and a small bridge connecting the two roads welcomed curious visitors.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a simple chapter but thank you for reading nonetheless:)


	7. The Hill of Baby Blue Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Soft awkward kids being soft and awkward

  
Weirdly enough for two people who were used to anxieties before and after missions, cursed rushes of adrenaline on the way and what not, it was hard for them to put a name to the convoluted emotions that soaked on them the moment they stepped further into that place. Maybe because their bodies were too used to connect any sort of peace to calmness before a storm; maybe because they were designed to respond to the adrenaline or anxiety - who knew at that point with their affected bodies- defensively that a type of tranquility this place had to offer was baffling and at the same time mesmerizing to them; maybe because the ambience, the air and nature was offering something with no sacrifice in return, and they didn’t need to hand over a piece of themselves on the way to be granted some sort of materialism as a substitute for a grain of fulfillment. “Will we ever be able to experience any of that happiness in our lives”, indeed. Indeed they’d either verbally or unconsciously question that, because they’d never allowed themselves anything close to peace. It wasn’t within reach; it wasn’t deserved; it wasn’t permanent, or genuine. Not ideal. Distracting? From what? Time-consuming? What times did they live that a mere moment of stepping back and taking a breath of relief would consume it, them? It was but a cycle they blindly worshipped, as it chewed on their flesh and patted their heads while handing out promotion-flavored candies. And now they’re here, and it’s real, and they don’t need to fall from their beds to wake up from their dreams and they don’t need to recollect them with a bitter “and then I woke up”. They’re awake, and they feel like they’ve fallen a gazillion times from their beds for that matter.   
~  
They walked the small bridge that connected the rural road with the adorned path to the forest. It was as if the tunnel of ivory and wide leaves hanging above their heads was never ending, until they were one last step to what looked like a full view of baby blue eyes colored sky; like the tunnel was the only place they could lay their feet on, and beyond that, only sky to hover under. At first it felt like being pushed at 2 off the back of an airplane but then their feet touched ground, and it wasn’t all sky they laid eyes on, but the freshly bloomed nemophila with a vivid baby blue, bluer than a clear sky. The audacious presence of millions of young baby blue eyes ringing in the wind cut the horizon, and then let the diluted blue of the morning sky fill up the motionless air above their heads. It was endless, breathtaking and almost numinous. Their faces were completely given up to awe and their eyes were wandering up and down, side to side, to reach the line they ceased, but everything was borderless.   
Mutsuki, on the midst of wonder, spared a moment to look at Urie’s face, who, no differently, was as astonished as his was, but seemed to have be just a little bit more absent than usually.

  
“Urie-ku..” He didn’t seem to respond to any type of verbal communication so, “Lost Uri came around today as well ,huh? This long lost twin of yours sure does visit pretty often. ” he decided to pinch him in the cheek since that was the only exposed body part he could directly reach, and see where it brought him.  
“Hey!! What? Why? That hurt!” And, he was back.   
“I get it nooow, that twin of yours is pretty sensitive on the cheeks. I’ll make use of this information wisely now, teehee!”   
“Don’t “teehee” me. That was a weak moment ,and you are never to speak of it again.”   
“What, is your manliness going to dissolve because I know you have sensitive cheeks now? If that’s the case, we’re in for a ride.” He said as he rubbed his little mischievous hands together. It was a given he’d never escape tease o’clock, but It sure came faster than he expected it today.   
“Saiko wasn’t wrong when she said you’re a meanie. ”   
“She was just butthurt I won Mario card three times in a row; that can’t possibly qualify me as ‘a meanie’. ” This was enough rambling for the day, as he cut his fruitless comment in half with another cheek attack, this time a peck. He grabbed on his hand and pulled him to the group of people they were previously walking with. His body might have become heavy from literally being 10 minutes into the sun (he and the sun are never on good speaking terms, or any) ,or he was going through some weird reaction from poking his sensitive spot, or he was just helplessly in love.   
Crack. Melt. Sizzle.

  
Damn him.   
He really was helplessly in love.

  
He’s usually pretty chill, pretty still; no over the moon emotions jumping impatiently from one cloud to the other, no pulse pounding on his eardrums like a lunatic in the middle of the night, no ribcage cracking from a rushing heartbeat, heart about to escape the layers it’s tucked in. But all these things he felt he wasn’t fit to feel suddenly conquered his immunity ,and went overboard the moment his eyes caught the aesthetically pleasing details of Mutsuki’s pastel blue shirt over the nemophila’s vivid background, his green hair contrasting this whole palette of different blues his brush couldn’t reach, his side profile which allowed a goofy smile to peak somewhere in there, and the gentle breeze of a myriad of different scents he only wished he could name and differentiate. His nerve endings twitched to touch the texture of the sky, smell more of everything , see and taste further than what his physical boundaries allowed him too. As an artist he wanted to freeze just about everything and step back, but as someone who ,let’s say, was pretty head over hills for the person dragging him further near the crowd, he couldn’t help but give in in to all his cells gravitating towards his.

  
He hadn’t been too proud about anything in his life. A genuine proud he meant, not a “I ranked up faster than Kuroiwa” kind of proud, or ”Saiko listened to me once and worked out more than 10 minutes” kind of proud. His presence hadn’t made anyone smile before (or at least for a non pretentious cause), or ever seen himself as anyone who could radiate some type of arbitrary positivity that was contagious enough to reach out to someone else. He couldn’t compliment, and was too stiff and awkward with any type of verbal communication that wasn’t demanded by work. But he somehow seemed to have light up his face for some reason and he could say he was genuinely proud of himself for that. Unsure about the cause, but rolling with it nonetheless. And it is contagious you know, smiling. One moment you feel like your face is composed and then next ,empathetically, you’re grinning like an idiot for the mere reason that someone else is. And you’re grateful.

  
“You should smile more; it really suits you, you know?” Urie felt slightly caught off guard.  
“Your eyes seem to disappear under your cheeks, and it looks like your moles move slightly closer to each other when you do.”   
“(Okay, this is not a drill Urie, say something) I guess I haven’t been too smart to find reasons to smile previously. And you know how far my moles are usually….interesting.” His face was overcome by an amused color with a slight indication of victory.   
“That’s because that was the first thing that caught my eye on you when we started living in the Chateau (besides being an edgelord) ,and I have to admit ( you’re probably going to kick my butt for this) that I would concentrate on them to look like I was interested in your 3 minute speech on ghoul statistics in meetings just because it would be unethical to doze off. There! I said it! But I don’t think you enjoyed talking that much either, so I hoped we were on the same boat on that at least.“ He had never rushed to end anything faster than this confession, and he seemed out of breath and a little embarrassed.   
“You keep proving you’re a meanie you know. “ The victory withered dramatically. But he kept a shy suggestive smile. Poor boy.   
“( I couldn’t kick his butt even if I wanted to though) But yes, I never enjoyed any of that either, it was a really specific demand of Matsuri to let me cover that. I was as puzzled as everyone in the room, but anything to get him to shut up. “  
“Yeaaah, he was a weird one, but let us not talk about Matsuri now. This is our uhh…” He was helplessly staring in his direction waiting for the finishing word he couldn’t say for the life of his.   
“I mean, you tell me. What made you bring me here? Aura and Ayumu were probably free too, no-” He felt he was taking the leash of the teasing in here, as one would expect from his usually sharp mouth( that gets pretty dull on his presence as a matter of fact) He has to be winning sometimes, he’s not that much of a loser. Right?

  
It would have been just the perfect timing to save some physical evidence for himself in defense of his cool, “not that much of a loser’s “attitude, but that seemed to be out of the question at that moment, as Mutsuki more or less struck again with a cunning intention on the cheeks but diverting his attack somewhere near his lips, cheekily and not too lightly. The means of this attack were silence him, as it was bittersweet short and superficial. And Urie was left quite awe-stricken and agape for like, probably the third time that day. Having a break from any of the wrecking emotions was out of his league. And Mutsuki would have preferred something similar to running the fuck away because what was he thinking?!   
The intention was to shut him up for the moment, but they unsurprisingly had a pretty silent walk until the end of the small path in the midst of the hill. It was filled with more awkward side eyeing and hand brushing and secret staring and being caught on action. Quite a stubborn as a mule he has to wiggle away from articulating the word “date” out of his god damn mouth, but he would quite willingly peck him men to shut up as he tried to convince him to say it. Go figure. It is safe to declare they’re pretty weird people, and they’re both perfectly aware. That’s at least good to know.

  
Just as they were about to enter the next garden of flowers, Mutsuki turned on his back and lightly pressed Urie’s arm to do the same thing.

  
“You know what are some rare powers of nemophila ? They are able to heal broken childhoods, make up for absent fathers, help you accept vulnerability, and build trust. This is quite the place for us to be don’t you think?”   
“For just how long have you been planning this trip again? I don’t believe in the randomness you suggested it.” A suspicious tone colored his voice, but it was mostly playful and curious.   
“The thing is, I’ve wanted to come for a long time, because, although it’s kinda weird for me to believe in these things, I might as well do when I feel too helpless. It feels like a refreshing hope, a new beginning. Besides you can’t really heal where you got sick, I think. And umm, you travelled all that way from Tokyo just to see me so might as well ask you to go the extra mile, literally, with me to here. But it looks like the sun took a toll on you so we should probably head ho-  
“Oh, the sun always takes a toll on me, this isn’t anywhere special when it comes to that. But it’s special because someone-, you wanted me to come with you. And uhh, I don’t get that very often, by that I mean never. I’m enjoying this as much as you are so, why should we? And there’s more flowers down the hill to look at so umm,” He extends his hand out to gesture his very humble invitation to walk on. “Shall we?”

  
He took Mutsuki’s slightly shaky hand on his, felt the natural squeeze he had started to love noticing just like his small “in the fluster gestures”.

  
Leaving behind the sky’s blanket under their feet, breathing the baby blue remedy for their hearts.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay listen i initially chose nemophila bc TheyRE SO DAMN PRETTYY but then i checked the symbolism ( that i dare u to check as well) and this is literally their flower gonna go cry now skdjslas


	8. Au revoir

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's time folks, grab the tissue a gain :')
> 
> https://youtu.be/JDa5tddBC8Y to make you sadder because that's what i do

  
It has been hard for Mutsuki to ask anyone to stay ever since Haise and Shirazu left, ever since he left. Leaving would be the easy part to him - just gulp down the memories accumulating on your throat, wipe any petty salted liquid pour down your cheeks as if it were an accidental raindrop on a sunny day, and say goodbye with a defeated smile on your face. You walk away somehow without averting your eyes back to notice just what you left behind, and what you left them with. They’ll be fine without me, you say. It won’t be too hard to have one less, right? Easy peasy deeds.

  
But then flipping the coin, watching someone he cares about step away; that deteriorates him. Because he can’t know what’s floating on their heads; he can’t know whether their leave to them is as easy as wiping a trivial tear away ,or as hard as swallowing down a sob. He can’t tell if they want to turn their head back and know what he, everyone must be going through; he can’t know if they call themselves “that one less” or do they feel like they planted something they want to go nurture back to. The need to know but awareness of the lack of any answers - it deteriorated him. Not easy.

  
He was aware Urie couldn’t stay long, even if he wanted to. And it was also utopic to wish him to stay forever, and probably too selfish on his side, as he was the one who abandoned them in the first place. He wasn’t too sure whether he would come back, could come considering his time or even wanted to on the long run. And so, he was left with a minute taste of bitterness and melancholia on his tongue. He couldn’t live any of this twice after all, so the least he could do is breathe everything thoroughly in and hold on to the small memories tight before they disappeared together with him on some funny trivial death that most Special Class investigators experience.  
Funny job indeed, build the house for a home and die a meaningless death soaked on black waters, leg migrated from arm, head from heart.

  
Now they had taken the same quiet seat on the train to go back home, after walking through all the little paths in the hill veiled in all sorts of colors and aromas. Looking on the side, Urie had his serene, composed expression on; in fact it was rare to catch him this tranquil although his expression never told much most of the time except a speck of irritation somewhere in his left brow and plain looking eyes, fatigued and mostly half opened. He was occupying himself with the zip of his jacket, flicking its metallic end side to side with dexterous fingers as he gazed at the blurred windows of the train. He couldn’t infer much from his eyes though, as they were isolated by his dark bangs.  
He should have asked him to stay someway. He really can’t and he knows how demanding their jobs are and he doesn’t want to be a bug but if he could, if he-  
“When do you plan on leaving?”  
“Hmm? Oh, right, it slipped my mind for a while. I should be back at around six today.”  
“D-do you perhaps want me to give you a ride? It can get hot around the hours you’re travelling in the train and I don’t really mind.”  
“Oh, I’ll be fine, besides I can’t have you come almost home and not meet everyone. And if you meet them you know they’ll want you to stay for a couple of days, which you can’t afford, I know that much. So, umm, next time maybe?”

_You know they’ll want you to stay. Oh._

_Maybe next time?_

_Next time._

“And when ,uhh, can next time be in your estimations? I’m sure you’ll be pretty busy and I don’t really want to ruin any-“  
“Firework Festival. Around that week, maybe. Mark your calendar.”

O- _Oh_.

He gave a softer than usual chuckle that almost restrained Mutsuki from smacking him on the shoulder for joking about exactly what he’d do.  
“And look, it started raining as well. Looks like I’ll need to take one last country shower before heading off, hmm?”  
He smiled silently as the sound of the raindrops resonating on the corridor of the train filled up their space. Maybe unconsciously, almost reflexively, Urie extended his hand on his lap again, a hand willing to warm, squeeze, create, demolish, fondle, love. In response to his invitation, he felt warmth intertwine his fingers, and the same old faint bumps of scars in between his knuckles. The scars he’s only seen as a beholder, now he gets to feel them on his knuckles as well, and somehow memorize how they extend and deepen. Rain taps louder above their heads, making them just a little sleepier than usually. Eventually, Urie felt his head tap on his shoulder, a small figure of a human snuggling closer to his arm as he puffed quite sleepy breaths out. He wanted to stay too, he figured at that moment, forever.

They had arrived back at their station, and Urie hurt for just a little while to wake him up from his beauty nap.  
“Hey, sleepy head… hey.” He tapped his nose a few times. He got a scrunched nose as a response, a sign he was awake but not willing to move.  
“(He really never actually sleeps, huh? Sometimes my ass, he looks like he hasn’t slept in days.)”  
He groggily dragged his head up from his shoulder and scratched his head, pulling his bangs up as if opening the curtains to let the light in.  
“We’re home already?” He yawned the words out.

 _Home_.

“Yeah. Let’s go.”

Walking back, the rain had been reduced to a lighter version of how they’d heard it pound against the lid just an hour before. However, it did manage to soak their clothes enough to stick to their skin and give them some more sore muscles on the long run. The earthy smells oozed back from the ground and caressed their nose, pungent and invasive.

  
On occasional days where Urie felt like withdrawing himself, at least emotionally , from the usual monotony of his current life, on nights when he couldn’t lay to sleep for the life of his, on meetings he couldn’t concentrate despite their importance, he liked to daydream about the phantom of something similar to a home, something that could be, or could have been. Only it weren’t somewhere, rather everywhere and nowhere. It wasn’t a place of known foundations he could go back to. It was more of something from everything his senses laid their presence on. He liked to find home in Saiko’s burned omelette, the way early morning airplanes stretched the noise of their loud machines into the broad edges of the sky and into his awake ears, Shirazu’s vexation when Haise beat his ass up on board games, the peculiar moods he woke up to wanting to pain Mutsuki for no particular reason, and the routine that he had formed filled with freshly washed brushes of different sizes, the dominant smell of layered pain that gave somehow more life to his face, and more and more layers to preserve such liveliness. They were random; just certain small occurrences that made him feel somehow safe and content. But in their randomness, they were complete.  
It was a list in his head, with all these things, and maybe the special smell of dampened soil on Mutsuki’s front yard had to be part of it as well. The smell of lavender on his skin, the thoughtful way in which the lady had wrapped that package, the fluffy texture of Calico’s fur against his skin, how Mutsuki’s breaths tingled his neck in a funny way as if Saiko was pulling a prank on him, the way his specs slide down his button nose and how he titled them back every other minute. Him. They all felt domestic, and pacifying, maybe arbitrary but they all seemed to be small godsends that somehow made themselves complementary to each other, although occurring independent of time and place. They felt like the fragmented colors of the setting sky above layers of braches and trees that he got to see on his front yard as well. They all seem to be running on individual agendas, each of them empirically unrelated, but when coming together, they breathed common life to the sky, and it felt unified, harmonious, a solid one.

A foundation .

  
He could sense the loneliness in his aura already - the one that hid itself under the clouds of lavender scented smiles and rice straw from everything else in this house. He could already feel the crippling insomnia stretching up his head and the soreness of his muscles from training and overtraining until they snapped to pieces. He hated to admit how he saw a ghost of what he used to be in him cling on all his movements, intertwined someway against his muscles.

Hyper-responsible, self-destructive, outstanding, shakable, breakable. Anxiety painted disturbing colors on the back of his head. It’s that anxiety again.

  
This was their final station before they parted ways. It wasn’t as if they’d go on redemption journeys, though. As if this was the last of what they’d see of each other. But three days seemed to have made up for years of not seeing each other every day, and somehow they’d grow just too familiar to their presence to part ways casually. They both knew what they’d go back to. They weren’t too ready to say goodbye.

  
Strange indeed, the way it got to be.

  
The clouds seemed to have sluggishly moved out of the way of the setting sun, just so it could warm their skins and lead the way they would part. It was almost natural, they way they turned on each other to borrow one last sight, one last word until next time.  
“I guess I should get going now, huh?” Breaking the ice with rhetorical questions like this. What an Urie thing.  
“I mean, I never kicked you out. But you have kids to teach how to hold a quinque’s and all so I can’t prevent you the honor and pleasure. Just don’t be mean to them; you’re already a scary looking one.” He fixed a bundle of hair sticking out of order and breathed one of his playfully soft smiles. Just for him.  
“Hey, I’m not too scary. And they’re not too innocent either. One of them was interested in my inexistent love life he felt it was necessary to give me advice.”  
“You look like the type that needs advice, though. But you’re kinda handsome, so that makes it even.” Lame handsome boy indeed.  
“You want to know what’s really lame?” God forbid the day Urie would take any initiative of this dangerous, horrifying sort, but the man simply crushed his lips on his as if he’d never had any kind of apprehension related to these…um, deeds. And it wasn’t a short-lived, teasing, ghost peppery kind of kiss that felt dangerous to last for too long. It was honey and chilly flavored one, the sweetness inviting taste buds out, the chilly making lips burn with desire, but easing the longing pain with the honey sweet drug. Easy going and gentle at first, but demanding and salted with desire and despair. They both felt a vicious hand stir they insides upside down, flipping them over and making them ache and burn and want. Mutsuki felt his hands on his waist bring him closer, as he made contact with the familiar prickliness of his undercut. And just then, they stopped to let some air fill them up and let their burning insides rest, hopefully.  
“You giving me a three second peck just to shut me up. That was weak of you. I think you learned what to do and not do now, hmm?” His cockiness just jumped out from hibernation and it caught Mutsuki by surprise with a blush.  
“Hey! Don’t tell me what to do! It was part of the plan, so I think I still won, no?  
“Yeaah, especially when you wouldn’t look at me for the entire walk; that was out of character. Or umm, was that part of the plan too?”  
“I’ll kick your butt if you keep trying to expose me any longer. I actually love kicking your butt so I still keep winning here. “  
“ (What a hard pill to swallow but I might as well love it too) Wait, you need to have something.” He washed the playfulness off his face the moment he was reminded of the little handmade present he held on his backpack.  
“Here!” He grabbed his sketchbook from his back and handed it to him eagerly.  
“It’s some small things I drew here and there from our _adventures_ in the chateau and the portrait you cramped you neck for. Hope you don’t want to kick my butt as much now, mmm?... And uh, fun fact, that was the only time I drew you perfectly accurate, the portrait.”  
“O//-oh//…so you…”  
“Not gonna spoil anything here, though.“ He threw a wink at him which only seemed to worsen his flushed situation.  
“Thank you… For coming here… For trying to reach out to me on Rueshima, and at the wedding and here. For keeping my secret. And umm, you can always call me if you wish to visit, I can pick you up. Everyone should come sometime, I miss everyone. “  
“Sure, Saiko would crawl on you if she ever spotted you on the horizon. And she keeps telling the ducklings some weird stories of our early days just so they get an idea of ‘Tooru-san’, but you should meet them. They admire you.”  
“I will, I miss visiting more often. I’m sorry I can’t visit too often.” His gaze lowered to near the ground but soon got a surprise lift from the chin.  
“Hey! It’s okay… And the train’s here. Well umm, guess I’ll see you on July then.” He only gave him a small peck on the forehead before collecting themselves into an embrace, but it wasn’t by any means sad. They didn’t want to it to be. It felt comforting and tender. It drew an invisible protective mantel over their skin that seemed to last even after they unlocked their bodies.

Heading to the train, he could see through the trains windows, his figure, short bangs fluttering in the wind, arms crossed on his chest as they groped the fabric of his shirt, and a melancholia coloring his features. He reached his hand up for a final wave before it departed.  
“(Please take care of yourself. I love you.” )

 

_Until next time_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think im gonna write one more chapter before i end this series, i got too emotional writing this so why not just write another chapter to poke on my open wounds :')  
> Thank you for all your support, i really appreciate comments and kudos!


	9. Recollection

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Putting things in perspective ft. Aika-san

  
When he lost trace of his presence on the horizon, he released the sketchbook from his embrace and held it on his hands, observing curiously. His grasp was delicate enough to think he would break it. He could sense his presence all over the cover, each paper physically. They had his scent engraved in each pore of the rough paper, a mixture of cologne and oil paint. He had always loved the peculiarity of this mixture because it was a scented representation of him. The sharp cologne was the vapors of his seriousness and shrewdness oozing from his presence superficially, whereas the oil paint mixed in his thoughtfulness for detail, craftsmanship and compassion into this mixture of scents, amalgamating him. He wouldn’t admit it, at least not back then, that he loved the benzene smell that always welcomed anyone even so near his room. Shirazu would scold him every morning for keeping his god damn door opened to poison the whole house with his “art shit things”. And Saiko tried her very hardest to not whither her face in disgust whenever he moved around the house. Haise swore he’d take him as a whole to the laundry.

He was probably used to having everyone almost throw up on his face approaching him, but it was sure surprising to Urie the lack of any apparent disturbed expression on Mutsuki’s face as he walked near him. And his genuine interest on his painting routine and how he chose his tools carefully at the stationary store nearby the CCG. It was a given that if he was dismissed earlier from the repetitious duties in his office, you’d find his teletransported in no time at the paint section in the stationary store on the other side on the road with a peculiarly named color in his hand.

He may or may not have visited the store a couple of times just so he could quench his curiosity as to what kept this man so hooked in there. Even though he wasn’t too knowledgeable when it came to brush types or differentiating paint brands, he still liked to walk the endless shelves of crafts just because of the careful arrangement, the soft and warm spot lights in each of the stands, how the arrayed oil paints dissolving their characteristic smell into the cool conditioned air of the store, and how it redirected his mind to his presence. Way back at the time, it was sheer curiosity since growing up he hadn’t been able to be in contact with anything bright of this sort, so he wouldn’t really want to paraphrase his feelings as affectionate - maybe out of pure denial. Just curiosity for the strange boy next door who went to the gym on extraordinary hours of the morning, hated sweetened beans, reeked of turpentine and had an exceptional short temper. _Still does_.

Nothing else.

  
Mutsuki ambled his way home as he further observed the object in his hand. He decided he’d look through it when he got home. As he entered his front yard, he could pick out Aika-san having her afternoon tea on the opposite veranda ,and gestured him to come join her. He could already guess the slightly embarrassing conversations she might throw in the table, but he decided to join her nonetheless.  
He placed the sketchbook on a vacant part of a shelve he’d found and waited for the right moment he could look through it carefully.   
She always greeted him so amiably with her wise smile and warm but robust hug that always caught him off guard. Although on her late sixties, she always had a vigorous hug to tell an in kilter from a frail Mucchan, and his poor regimes of sleeping and eating always - one way or another - expose themselves to her detectors. She poured him a cup of green tea and observed him as he first wrapped his hands on the cup and then quietly sipped on it. And then placed the china cup on the wooden table slowly.   
“You’ve lost some weight again Tooru. You worry so much about training but you don’t seem to eat enough. I hope you’re eating everything I’m sending you.”  
“I have! But there’s only so much I can eat in a day considering I’m not even home for most of the time. I don’t know what’s up with my weight though. Maybe I should see a doctor.”   
“I think …you should take some time off and see your friends. You’re too young to work this much and not enjoy yourself on the meantime.”  
“Maybe so.” He raised his cup to his lips and took another mindful sip.  
A pause happened to well up.  
“Did Urie-kun leave?” And he almost choked on it of course.   
“Y-yeah. He had to be home by six.”   
“He loves you.” His lips froze on the cup’s lips, eyebrows raised at her, cheeks mischievously flushed.

See, the thing is that her face will always be frozen to relaxed closed eyes and small lips that occasionally curl up and produce a muffled sound of a satisfied laughter. But there’s no way of indicating when she will decide on a sudden change of topic like that.   
“He looks pretty determined about it too.” She continued. He laid the already empty cup besides the teapot and avoided any chance of eye contact with her out of pure embarrassment.   
“Don’t let him go, he’s a good kid. “ He recollected his voice and tried to speak his mind.   
“Y-yeah but…the thing is that he lives in Tokyo and is as busy as I am with work. All he can do is maybe visit once or twice a year if he’s lucky. So, uhhh-  
“How long have you known each other for?”  
“ Well, we were both nineteen when we started working as a squad, so I guess eight years.”  
“So you probably know all the jots and tittles of each other, hmm?”  
“ You could put it that way.” He puffed a shy chuckle. He wished he could still sip on his empty cup but that would be just too weird in that situation. In fact in every situation.  
“He’s probably been waiting for a long time, and thought about it a lot, considering he willingly travelled from Tokyo to see you. Though I thought I had seen him once before. He does remind me a little of my husband when he was younger, so it’s probably just my mind playing trick on me, fufu…”  
“Maybe you remember when he and another girl helped me settle down the boxes when I moved here.”  
“ …Ahh, yes I remember now, that girl as well. She was like a small doll; she should come visit too. You seem to be close with her as well, no? “ She ended her question on a sweet, almost maternal note that although Mutsuki was used to, it always managed to give his heart a fuzzy embrace.  
“Y-yeah, the three of us used to live together with another guy and our mentor for a while.”   
“Oh, there’s another of you as well! Where is he now?”   
He forced his muscles to blurt the words out, but they seemed to lump up on his throat icy, and maybe for a second or two he felt himself space out.   
“Oh, honey I’m really sorry for your friend. He must have been really dear to you all… Maybe I should stop-“  
“No no, it’s fine, really…Uh, Shirazu passed away six years ago on a mission… H-he always worked so hard to pay for his sister’s accommodation costs at the hospital, and was maybe the only person that kept our spirits up on our darkest days. “  
“May his soul rest peacefully, and God bless his sister.” They both put their hands in a prayer position together to pay proper respect to the deceased.   
“And your mentor?” He felt the damned lump reappear again on his throat, but he managed to pull himself together without showing any sign of discomfort.  
“He is married and expecting his second child. He doesn’t really practice much of heavy investigating on recent days. He has settled down more or less. ”   
“Mmm, I’m glad for him. May he have a happy life as well with his family.”   
“…I hope so too.” He lowered his gaze and caught sight of his fingers playing with the fabric of his shirt.

  
“Would you like some more tea?”   
“Yeah, sure.” She poured him another cup of tea as well as herself. She took a long sip from hers, and then settled it carefully on the table.   
“If you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to know something more about these friends you used to live with? How do they drink their tee? What fillings do they eat mochi with? They’re important facts to me. ”   
“Yes ahah! So, um, Saiko and Urie live together with four other new members that I haven’t really gotten to know much since I’ve been away. Well, Saiko is really fond of sweets, or any food in general, especially our mentor’s. At first she wasn’t really into… working but Shirazu used to physically drag her out of bed to meetings or at the guy. She just loved snacking and gaming too much to bother ahaha! She always drew Urie on her funny comics and hanged them around the house just to get on his nerves hehehe. Not that she doesn’t now though… But now she teaches children in the academy and has grown up to be more responsible and help hold the weight of the house that Urie can’t. And she calls every other day to update me on Urie’s failed cooking and weird things like that. She’s really adorable, you’ll love her instantly.”  
“What a sweet girl, fufu!”

  
“Shirazu. He… used to be the rebellious type at the beginning - but not without competition - ,was constantly up Urie’s throat (which was pretty reciprocal actually), loved motorcycles and playing video games with Saiko. After he was promoted Squad Leader, he tried his best to always be someone people looked up to, and sometimes bit more than he could chew.I used to be insecure about myself beyond belief and he was probably the only person that I could trust with giving me a lift at that time. Urie didn’t use to accept any of this, but he cared a lot about him. He trusted him more than himself, but he wasn’t the best with words at the time, you see…

  
“Ha-, Kaneki, our mentor, he managed to dig into our hearts as a parental figure that maybe most of us never had in our childhood. Saiko always called him maman, and still does. All of us…we didn’t really have a proper family, or a home, so living there under his care mended some of the things broken from our childhood. And his cooking was the most delicious things I’ve tried. I even managed to learn because of him! He was an outstanding investigator, but you would never guess since he was always so gentle with us and a really soft spoken man even when giving orders. He had a lot of trouble with us at the beginning. Urie and Shirazu would wander around making him pay for unnecessary taxi receipts, Saiko only woke up to eat, and I somehow tried to make up for everyone by doing my best and because I didn’t want to let him down. But I was too weak to do anything and probably not fit to be an investigator at all. Anyhow, we grew into each other a lot during that time, but then Shirazu… passed away and Haise went through some personal things as well, and it was only left the three of us in the end. Rather two. I was being thrown from one squad to the next and sometimes had it hard to even come home to them.   
“And, Urie…a tough one indeed!” His lips curled up in amusement.   
“ Not the friendliest or the most cooperative in a group back then. He liked to live the lone wolf life and would bite if you tried to get him to interact… I forced him to buy groceries once and side eyed me the whole day. But I could relate to some extend to his alienation and pettiness, because I …grew up all my teenage years alone and isolated from everyone too. And so, even though I wasn’t in a better position myself, I tried to encourage him to interact with everyone, just because I knew he didn’t want to be alone however arrogant and unfazed he sold himself to everyone. We were grouped on missions a lot, and we learned to trust each other more. He learned to rely on people, and I felt more useful and competent on the process. Saiko and Shirazu ganged up to tease the life out of him occasionally but he always cracks up with the bullshit they came up with now. Uhh, he’s also a really good artist and he hates sweet food… and too much spice. He almost chokes himself to death once because Kaneki had gone overboard with the spices ahaha! “  
“Poor boy, fufufu…So you reached out to him first? “  
“Y-yeah, it was kind of reflexive in a sense.”  
“But it’s strange, how he never let you know for so long, he must have chewed himself up during that time.”  
“It wasn’t ideal for neither of us actually. During that time, we had uhh, many loose ends, unresolved conflicts…” Breathe in, breathe out.

  
“Being an investigator meant you had to fight all kinds of ghouls, and I happened to fight someone out of my nightmares, which stirred my mind in the worst way. Urie didn’t cope with Shirazu passing on the best way either. From that time, I became too repulsive and was pursuing some things I didn’t need, but couldn’t help ,which only scarred me in the end. It opened the Pandora’s box you could say. Urie tried to stop me, but I wasn’t willing to be stopped. It spiraled into some dark paths until Saiko was the one to knock some sense in me. Just because we both were on our worst. However bad we poked on each other’s wounds unintentionally, he always seemed to have my back, always seemed to be around to shield me when I thought I was going to die. Or had the intention too. I felt secure around him, like a place where I could take a breath of fresh air. I couldn’t really name what I was feeling though, since I used to define love in different words than what our relationship was. But I could trust him with my life.” He took a long sip from his cup to restore his energy.  
“In the end, I needed time to come to terms with my identity, and so did he. We weren’t saints, far from that actually. So yeah… But oh my god, you’re still listening to my rambling, thank you! I thought you were going to doze off half way. I tend to not be too condensed with words when I talk about memories of that time, just because they’re really dear to me, despite all the hardship. “

  
“Don’t be silly, of course I was going to listen to you, I’ve told you, you’re like my child now… well, you two seem to have passed the storm, so now just wait for the skies to clear up themselves, will you? He’s seen you in your worst, yet he still travelled from Tokyo to meet you. To me it looks like he doesn’t want to let you go, and you shouldn’t as well. “  
“…I won’t” He added as he directed his glassy eyes and smile to the remaining liquid in the end of his cup. He raised it eagerly to his lips as he drank the last drops, and gave off a relieved breath. The lady was just about to collect everything to the kitchen, but was offered to sit down and let everything be cleaned by him. She did accept his offer politely.

  
As he brought everything to the kitchen, he felt a sense of order wrap around his headspace. He had never been able to put their situation in perspective as well as he did today. He felt he had too many things he couldn’t wrap his head around, but it felt like it made perfect sense today. It might have been the green tea giving him lucidity or the fact that he spoke to someone about it after forever years of trying to work it out himself. He couldn’t open up to anyone there, even Aura or Ayumu. They were too confused themselves to deal with his convoluted thoughts, and he couldn’t feel a sense of connection with them like he had in the chateau. They were colleagues, friends, teammates, sure, but he didn’t feel at ease like he’d wanted to, like he was used to back then.

  
After setting the china in the order Aika-san always wished to find them, he wished her a good afternoon and headed back home with a hand of ease patting him in the back.

 


	10. 11:11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oookaay folks i managed to get my shit together and write this.Hope you'll enjoy this as much as i did!

  


The night had already soaked the sky as Mutsuki lighten up the last lantern on the veranda. It was chilly enough to roughen his skin in goose bumps as he rubbed on his arms to generate just a little heat before he cuddled something warm around his shoulders. Warming up on the kotatsu, he could vividly hear every sound of the night penetrate his ears, every chill and shaky breath contribution in this symphony as well. Maybe unconsciously he anticipated Urie’s tall figure sitting in the veranda sketching the evening away, but there was only a shadow of him lingering on his favorite spot, only a light scent swaying around the house and tickling his nose with the usual familiarity, and the sketchbook in his hand, the only manifestation of him he could touch and feel it weigh on him.  

Opening up the cover, the first thing that caught his attention was the old picture they had taken as a squad back then. All of them with their round faces and determined eyes and unstained hands. Together. He always wondered how come Urie had never framed this back then, since he never saw it around his room on occasions where he would peak his head in without his permission. But it had been there, tugged under rough sheets of paper, maybe warmer than they will ever feel on the days to come.

As he shifted the picture on the side, he saw his small sketch of the picture, steep lines that curved on the sides of their cheeks and emphasized carbonated color near their eyes. It followed the reference religiously, but it had authenticity; the lines had a distinctive pattern, the shading smooth. The paper’s rough texture made friction with his fingers and he felt its presence magnified under his finger, the rubbing sound amplified by the night calm nature and his relaxed almost absent breathing. The couple next pages consisted of building sketches, some of their sight arousing memories back from the dead. He spent some time taking each detail in distinctively, appreciating the realistic approach he took on all of the destinations and the amount of effort on each construction.. And  on the side of each paper, with a rough handwriting were the dates created and in some, weirdly enough, the hour too.

The bakery was where they’d pass by after every mission when their guts were rumbling violently. The time where they’d all gobble food as fast as they could and then there was Urie waiting outside because “the sweet smells of the bakery made him sick”. And of course he didn’t eat anything. Haise had to cook something for him because he probably liked being a little spoiled. Just a little.  He wouldn’t eat it right away though.  Then there was a sketch of the chateau, and the road down the hill just feet away from the lake where they’d take morning runs, or rather drag each other out to the next coffee shop for a reboot. He used to like taking really early morning runs with Urie, because his pace was fast enough to work Mutsuki’s butt off. He always welcomed him with a “I won’t slow down for you” treatment, but that was just reasons for Mutsuki to catch up to him even more. And it worked.

September 11th, 1:30pm. He sketches on lunch breaks now, Mutsuki thought.

Next there was a picture of Saiko lifting one of Urie’s heaviest weights with her kagune, her usual smug expression carved on her face. And then next to it was his take on it, the sketch of her kagune mighty, as she sat on the gym floor blowing some cool air on her face with another weird fan- like projection of her kagune. And there went Urie’s pride on his weight lifting. A girl half his height and soft looking grabbed one of the weights he had never been able to pull and swung it on his face. And what’s funnier is that he felt the need to document it with his own signature. October 30th, 11:40 pm. Probably couldn’t sketch during the day because Saiko and the other kids might have dragged to any Halloween party… maybe. It was hard for Mutsuki to just imagine him in any of them though. He couldn’t hold back a laughter.

Flipping to the next page was a picture of Urie’s apparent angry napping face with more moles than he usually counted as the caption on Saiko’s handwriting said “Maman, I don’t like this chocolate chip cookie.” But he apparently hadn’t sketched it because he knew better than to discredit himself like that. (  There were many ways apparently, and he knows.) But  he had kept it.

All the previous sketches had lightheartedness in them; they felt spontaneous and relying on the heat of the moment. However Shirazu’s sketch was one that emitted delicacy. It was polished with the perfect shading although there were some shadows of lines that apparently hadn’t met his expectations. Maybe he couldn’t remember his as vividly, maybe he could but he felt his hand wasn’t fit to recreate him, breathe life back to him. And yet he felt animated, about to jump out of the surface of the paper, flash his wide jagged smile again and come to his feet. Most probably complain to Haise about never ever wanting to crossdress for a mission because Saiko stuffed his bras with snacks that were too heavy on his poor back.

November 14th , 4:15 am. _The day after Shirazu’s memorial day._ He probably couldn’t sleep as much as he too couldn’t that day.

 

And next it was him. His with the ugly fringe he cut himself just because he didn’t want to explain himself to any barber. With his sterile looking eyepatch that hid what everyone had already seen and got used to expect for himself. Only because he hated how untamed his kakugan was, flashing with a rawness he didn’t want to get used to, but soon did. He was smiling too innocently there. The person in the sketch, almost looking like an identical twin, was actually smiling genuinely. It wasn’t to deceive, to conceal, to cope. It stemmed from the heart, it fed on an innocence he’d lost since birth and a serenity that would then dissolve into madness. It wasn’t him, it was what Urie made of him. It never occurred to him that someone from the outside would perceive him like that, just because he demonized each tissue of his being too much to do that. And it startled him, because he had depicted how he wished to feel. What he could have been.

December 26th, 4:16am . _The morning after Christmas_. Maybe he should have visited back then.

 

And after those pages, he felt the continuity lost. There were remnants of torn off pages, many of them. As if the string was cut, and something or someone distraught him enough to not grab a pencil for months. He could picture him and his deteriorated sleeping patterns, not being able to go back to his sketchbook or bed, frustrated, sleep-deprived, going about his usual walks just before sunrise, maybe overthinking, maybe just wanting coffee.

He had managed to take off however. There was a relatively rough sketch almost every day of small trivial things which managed to lift his spirit up probably and kill him some boring time in meetings as the time included working hours.  There was the railroad that they always took to go to a really specific Indian restaurant that Haise loved. There was, what he could guess, sketch of Ichika trying to dig her teeth on an apple as big as her face with frowned eyebrows and a stubborn look on her face. Then there was a picture of her showing off one of her teeth that had fallen off, and next to it was his sketch of the little girl doing the exact same thing. _Then her growing, then her living._

He had never met her. He had only visited e few times during Touka’s last trimester and just a couple of months after she gave birth, but he had never seen the baby. Not because he was left out of the celebrations. Not because Kaneki didn’t want him to, not because he was busy. He couldn’t bear to look at her fragile face and not recollect the scattered pieces of the glass he had broken. Touka always invited him over. He had managed to give her an apology in some way it didn’t shatter him in front of her, and she had accepted it, but he still felt he couldn’t accept her hospitality, he who offered her anything but that.

Everything with Kaneki was different however, more convoluted. It required a conversation with engagement from both sides. It wasn’t an easy pill to swallow; it couldn’t begin and end with an apology. It didn’t require an apology only, it required common ground, context, somewhere to hold on to, something not inferred, but stated explicitly. It was difficult, but no impossible.However it needed a courage he failed to accumulate on the last days before he left.

 

Ichika was two when he left. He only managed to look at pictures Saiko sent him of her crawling on Urie’s back and maybe pulling on her hair. He saw her grow up, only it was fragmented, one picture at a time. He was an outsider when she took her first steps, when she threw up all over Higemaru or called Kaneki once half ass bastard because Nishiki babysitted her for a day. He couldn’t witness her gradual growth, how the features from both her parents manifested on her face, how he small limbs gained rigidness. But she was a dear person he wanted to meet in the future, with hopefully no doubt or fear or regret. He wanted to hear her laughter just as loud as it felt in Urie’s sketch. He felt his hand shake flipping the next page. The date noted March 15th. I _t was her birthday._ The day he’d bring small things to her, the day he’d only meet Urie and Saiko to give her the small presents as they urged him to come inside.  Apples, head ribbons, small books.

His fingers trembled their way to the next page. It was him again. This time his hair whitewashed. His gaze lacking warmth and content, but it still had a glimpse of what it used to be. Innocent. Undefiled. His face still managed to light up on a smile, despite being dejected, like a rubber band on the verge of snapping. Where was its reference though? When had he smiled like that to him after what happened? Or himself? Or anyone?  It felt if he were moving in that sketch he’d be ambling around, in searching for something that wasn’t there, anxious, demanding. But this didn’t seem to have stopped him from still depicting him with a sense of grace, he almost daresay beauty. Like he ignored how he was losing weight, how his gaze was lost and empty, his speech glacial and formal to him as if it were day one. Mutsuki in the sketch hadn’t seen much. He felt vital. He looked safe.

The paper was wrinkled some places, loose from evaporated moist. He wanted to believe Saiko had spilled something on it. But he never sketched around people.  

April 27th, 3:46am. _The night after he left._

 

After many other remains of torn of pages- what he’d never get to see- there was something…a  disturbing manifestation draw in there. He had never seen any other page depicting this style. It was abstract, but he never sketched anything like that on paper. It was formless, generous with patterns, roughly drawn as the pencil was thick and it left a deep trace where it left its sign. Urie’s lines were always confident, but the ones in this paper were wiggly without any purpose. They started smooth and predictable and in the middle they oscillated slightly, imperfectly, and then ended how they originally started out to be. It was insomnia and anxiety coexisting in a body he’d never seen amalgamate in  any of his lively nightmares.

May 25th, 4:40am. _The early morning before he visited._

 

The last pieces of paper were dedicated to what they’d experienced throughout the weekend. It wasn’t a long time to draw so much, but he had made it happen nonetheless. Mutsuki had to admit he didn’t spend all the hours of the day around him, but it seems those had been productive to him. He had managed to walk around and find a good place to make a rough sketch of the entire house from the outside. The next page was occupied by something from everything, cherry blossoms, the nemophila, the antiquated tree on his front yard, the lanterns on his veranda. The floral aesthetic extended on each page to come, as if he had collected each flower around this area and threw it in paper. They were minutely detailed, cherry blossoms with they pointed pistils, lavender and their bundled buds around the stem, hydrangea and their full leaves. He could almost smell their fragrances as each of them evoked lucid memories of the days that had passed.

He had come to a conclusion his graphic memory was fantastic after they’d met. He managed to grasp the liveliness of every moment with more confidence than before, as he looked at another drawing of his this time. He was holding Calico up in the air. It felt serene, but it wasn’t idealistic. There was no innocent smile to compensate the lack of reference, to wish upon three time to the genie and grand him his mental peace back. The previous ones were beautiful, but they were soaked in denial. This one however, it managed to reflect his true nature in that instant. Urie had been able to recollect what he had lost throughout the time, and now the puzzle was beginning to make sense, the drawing based on a real life event. And Calico looked as fluffy as he felt; he, genuinely happy in the moment, at peace. Raw and crystal clear.

The last page of the drawings, but not the sketchbook, contained what he had anticipated since the moment his neck stiffened up for this. It was the portrait at the train.  He could feel his eyes well up with a myriad of emotions.

May 27th, 11:11 am. And a note just bellow it.

_I love you. Take care of yourself, okay?_

He saw the paper become cockled just above the note.

Damn him.

 

~~~~ bonus cliche phone conversation because i'm a loser for them~~~~~

 

Maybe this was a reckless thing to do, but he decided to call him.

_U: Hello? Mutsuki?_

_M: Hey,, you’re home right?_

_U: yeah, arrived 30 minutes ago…You okay?_

_M: Ahh, yeah of course. I umm, so… I looked at the sketchbook._

_U: ….and?_

_M: Saiko actually dethroned you in weightlifting, I’ve been laughing forever ahahhaah_

_U: and here I thought you would actually compliment my drawing…_

_M: but I will, they were all really pretty._

_U: did you look till the end?_

_M: ...that was mean of you, I’m gonna say that much, okay? *sniff*_

_U: Wait… are you .. maybe… CRYING??_

_M: I’ll kick your butt right now you’ll actually feel it through the phone_

_U: heheehe, it’s okay. but I meant that…_

_U: And please don’t starve yourself to death. That lady must cook deliciously._

_M: I won’t….i love you_

_U: … I love you too. Goodnight!_

_M: Actually sleep okay? There's enough time during the day to draw,,_

_U: you're the one to speak ,hmm_

_M: i'm improving,mind you....goodnight!_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This whole thing was actually a first for me when in came to writing, since i never write this long, but i can't express enough how much i enjoyed all of this ,and all your comments and support. Maybe this wraps up about everything i ever wanted to write about them, maybe it doesn't. Even if i never write anything of them in the future, i think that them as characters (before 179, screw 179) have shaped my writing so much. It's like their distinctive traits will linger for a long time in my head while writing.   
> Since i really want to improve, i would gladly appreciate any constructive criticism on my writing!   
> Thank you so much for reading along!

**Author's Note:**

> An attempt to give 179 Urie (and mutsuki) some context bc they both shut up again and i'm tired of their asses :')


End file.
